Travel back in time at Barcelona's oldest restaurant

BARCELONA, May 20 (Xinhua) -- In a narrow, unnoticed alley just inches away from the most bustling touristic street of Barcelona, La Rambla, people start to wait outside a dark brown wooden door by the walkside before the lunch time everyday.

Can Culleretes, as is written on a small bronze sign above the door, is the name of the small restaurant. But it has one specialty: it was founded in the year 1786, more than two centuries ago.

According to the Guinness World Records, the restaurant is the oldest in the city of Barcelona, Spain's northeastern region of Catalonia. It ranks second in Spain after Casa Botin, founded in 1725 and located in the Spanish capital Madrid.

The Agut-Manubens family has ran the restaurant since 1958.

"We are a family-run business and there are always family members in the restaurant. My parents started managing the restaurant 60 years ago, then, it was our turn, my sister and I with our husbands and sons and daughters," Montserrat Agut-Manubens, the current owner told Xinhua.

"We cherish the restaurant and its food as our family heritage," she said, adding that they always maintain a good quality in their Catalan traditional cuisine, which is based on fish, meat, stews and home-made deserts.

"The basic menu remains the same for over half a century, but meanwhile we also added some innovations to the list according to the seasons."

For Mrs. Agut-Manubens, the restaurant and her life have been integrated as one. She lives in a flat by the side of the restaurant, only two minutes by walk.

The restaurant was founded by Joaquim Pujol at the end of the 18th century and was expanded in 1958 in order to make it bigger, Agut-Manubens explained, highlighting that visitors can still see some of the tiles from 1786 and frescos on some of the walls from the 19th century. An iron oven of over a century ago is still preserved in the hall, next to the dining table.

Famous figures from Barcelona and other places enjoyed Can Culleretes meals all over the years, including painters, bullfighters, politicians, poets, journalists, and musicians. Like a mirco reflection of local celebrities, their pictures, some of them with signatures, have been on the walls of the restaurant since 1958.

Gastronomy is an important part of Barcelona's tourism. There're more than 7,400 restaurants and bars in the city, which received some 9.86 millions tourists in the year 2016. Enditem